[ajjohnsonsoxfan]

You ever start reading a thread and get halfway through and realize it's years old? (don't know how I missed it years ago) Loved finding this thread today and reading all the great stories. Good to see lots of names mentioned years ago that are still with us and active today.

Someone mentioned being nostalgic about being a kid and trading cards with your buddies. in the early 80's, I have such fond memories of trading cards into the wee hours of the night, drinking JOLT colas with buddies Matt Slavin and Aaron Lindsay. If we were lucky one of Aaron's older bro's would bring his binder and we would wheel and deal some major 4 way trades.

One summer (had to be in 1984) I spent a month with my cousin in Danville CA and in exchange for helping restore the backyard deck (lots of hand sanding), my Uncle would give us some $ and we would ride our bikes down to the local card shop and spend it all on cards. Wish someone had schooled me on vintage because all we cared about was 84 Topps, Donruss and Fleer. I remember the dealer selling us these large format 84 Topps cards that he thought would skyrocket in value. LOL. Wish I had bought CJ's instead!

It's been super fun getting to know so many great guys in the hobby and drilling down with set, type or player focuses.

Shout out to my CJ buddies like Thomas Prince, Jim Chanin, Brady Hill, Eric Pugh, Anthony Nex, Jay Kaplan, Adrian (yes that Adrian), Stan Loch, Andy Montero, Don Hontz, Jason Glasser, Barry Kahn, Scott Smith, Eitan Bouskila, George Tiwari and Bob Dimand.